First released in 2008, Microsoft System Center is a suite of products which simplify the deployment, configuration and management of IT infrastructure for both on-premises and hybrid cloud environments. System Center products assist with infrastructure monitoring, infrastructure provisioning, software deployment and patching, automation, backup and IT service management.
Since 2008 there has often been rumors that System Center will be discontinued (some even started by Microsoft!), but 16 years on and System Center is still going strong and is set to be around for a lot longer with the recent announcement of System Center 2025.
System Center 2025 Release Date Q4 CY 2024
Microsoft have said that System Center 2025, the next release of their Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) will be GA (General Availability) in the fall of 2024. They have confirmed that all the System Center products:
- Operations Manager
- Virtual Machine Manager
- Orchestrator
- Data Protection Manger
- Service Manager
will be released in their 2025 form by Quarter 4, calendar year 2024. This is to align with the Windows Server 2025 release, so that there is management support for the latest Windows Server version right from Day 0.
What’s new in System Center 2025
New capabilities announced so far for 2025 include:
- Management & monitoring of Azure Stack HCI 23H2 clusters with VMM & SCOM 2025.
- Enhanced conversion of VMware VMs to Windows Server through VMM.
- Support for the latest versions of Linux distros will be available with the General Availability of SCVMM 2025.
- DPM adds the capability to exclude specific disks from backups in Hyper-V environments.
The 2025 release also focuses on security enhancements across the System Center suite:
- Significantly reduced the number of scenarios which use CredSSP and NTLM as the authentication mechanism.
- Support for Transport Layer Security (TLS) version 1.3, ensuring that all data transmissions are protected by the latest security standards.
- DPM 2025 introduces the capability to securely store passphrase in Azure Key Vault, and support for OLEDB 19.
When it comes to System Center Orchestrator, there has so far been no official word on what updates or enhancements are coming, beyond TLS 1.3 which is a suite wide update, but we are aware the automation product group have some improvements in the pipeline which should ship with the 2025 release.
What does System Center 2025 mean for Orchestrator Users
The first thing System Center 2025 means for Orchestrator users is that there is a long-term future for your existing investments, as with the new release of 2025, Microsoft support for Orchestrator is extended out to 2035 (standard support 2030 + extended support to 2035).
We can also confirm that Kelverion will support our Integration Packs for Orchestrator 2025.
This announcement from Microsoft does have implications for customers running Orchestrator 2019 and older versions. With this release you will now be running a version that is at least current -2 (i.e. at least 2 releases old), and you can therefore expect that all of Microsoft’s development focus will be on the latest version. So, whilst 2019 and 2016 are still under extended support from Microsoft, they are going to be firmly in the security updates only category going forward.
So, if you haven’t already started the process, now is a very good time to start looking at a migration to Orchestrator 2022.
For more information on migrating to Orchestrator 2022:
About Kelverion
Kelverion are experts in Microsoft Automation with over a decade of experience in System Center Orchestrator, Azure Automation, Power Automate and Logic Apps. Kelverion provides a complete automation platform hosted in Microsoft Azure to simplify customers’ automation journey.
For more information, to arrange a discovery call or to see a demonstration please contact our helpful team today via info@kelverion.com.
